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Sometimes momentum counts for more than we imagine in creative careers. James Stewart, Hitchcock's preferred leading man during much of this period, had started the decade with a series of westerns directed by Anthony Mann (Winchester '73, Bend of the River, The Naked Spur, The Far Country, The Man from Laramie) that have passed the test of time as genre classics. And nothing becomes an American legend more than playing legendary Americans like Glenn Miller (The Glenn Miller Story) and Charles Lindbergh (The Spirit of St. Louis). But the secret weapon would turn out to be Stewart's leading lady in...

Frank Sinatra was emerging from the infamous dark period of his career in 1954, buoyed by his performance in From Here to Eternity and the Oscar he won for best supporting actor. Long gone was "Swoonatra" and the bobby-soxer legions outside the Paramount Theater on Times Square a decade previous. Also gone was Ava Gardner, now with matador Luis Miguel Dominguin, though their divorce wouldn't be finalized for three more years. It was a leaner, meaner Sinatra that rebounded from what was considered a fatal career slump, and he followed up Maggio in From Here to Eternity by playing a...

Doris Day was an incredibly popular and Republican singer and film star, who used her fame to establish the Doris Day Animal Foundation. She said: "I like joy; I want to be joyous; I want to have fun on the set; I want to wear beautiful clothes and look pretty. I want to smile, and I want to make people laugh. And that's all I want. I like it. I like being happy. I want to make others happy." In the movie “Love Me Or Leave Me” which was nominated for 6 academy awards (winning Best Story for Daniel Fuchs),...

Manson, she warned. SNIP One such tidbit takes us back to the Hollywood Hills of the 1960s, when Charles Manson was recruiting kids of the famous and well-to-do into what would become his infamous murder cult. Manson wooed, or attempted to woo, the likes of Terry Melcher, the son of Doris Day, Deana Martin, daughter of Dean Martin, and Lansbury's kids, Anthony and Deidre Shaw. Dame Lansbury recounted how Diedre in particular fell under Manson's sway and how she plucked both her kids out of Hollywood and absconded to Ireland in a 2014 interview with Mail Online. "It started with...

The coronavirus story continues the Dictatorship of COVID-19 worldwide the Faucian version of how humanity is supposed to live with the backdrop of President Trump's diagnosis and treatment now underway. "If we had an honest media" starts this Twitter post..... We'll move forward and consider those from the world of music who have moved on this week. He was one of my friend's favorite singers back in the 1970's and songs like this remind me why my friend loved the music of Mac Davis who passed away this week at the age of 78..... Before we remember the music of...

There's a new biography of Charles Manson out this month -- which seems like the last thing America needs, in light of the reams of print that have already been devoted to the wannabe pop star who led his "family" to commit nine murders in the summer of 1969, terrifying Los Angeles. And yet Manson: The Life of Times and Charles Manson by Jeff Guinn is riveting, a thoroughly researched biography that manages to be a breezy page-turner. Even those who've already read extensively about the Manson murders and their aftermath may find new insight into the pint-sized West Virginia-born...

In the early hours of this morning, Doris Day died at her home in Carmel, California. Only a week or so back, my old boss Conrad Black and I were affectionately contemplating her hundredth birthday, but she fell, alas, a little short: Ninety-seven. It was a splendid run, notwithstanding that she chose to spend the last half-century taking care of her dogs rather than her fans. The song below is from half a lifetime ago, but was one of her last public performances: [Doris Day: The Way We Were] Below, from my book The [Un]documented Mark Steyn, is my reflections...

It's a funny thing about "culture." It changes. That's because people die and new ones get born, and along the way, Things happen, events of one kind and another -- wars, elections, recessions, new inventions. The so-called culture bounces off these various events in surprising ways. Which is another way of saying I don't think Doris Day -- sad to say, the late Doris Day -- would make it in today's culture, the culture of Lady Gaga and the "Avengers" series and, let us not forget (as if the media would allow it), "Game of Thrones," to whose coming demise...

Doris Day sings: "I Remember You" from her album "Day By Day" (1956) Recorded with Paul Weston and his orchestra. Doris Day recorded I Remember You on September 21, 1956 for her Day by Day album. Victor Schertzinger - Johnny Mercer - I Remember You Paul Weston - leader David Klein - contractor Geroge Van Eps, Bernard 'Barney' Kessel - guitar Jack Ryan - bass Nick Fatool - drums Paul T Smith - piano Ann M Stockton - harp Theodore M Nash - saxophone Cy Bernard, Armand Kaproff - cello Alvin Dinkin, Paul Robyn, Stanley Spiegelman - viola Israel Baker,...

Doris Day - Que Sera Sera

FULL TITLE: Hollywood mourns one of its greatest stars as wholesome screen icon Doris Day dies of pneumonia aged 97 Hollywood legend Doris Day has died at the age of 97. Her death was announced by her charity, the Doris Day Animal Foundation, on Monday. The foundation said in a statement that she was surrounded by close friends and 'had been in excellent physical health for her age, until recently contracting a serious case of pneumonia.' She died at her estate home in Carmel Valley, California, where she has lived in solitude for the last several decades with her dozens...

The actress, who has died aged 97, worked with the greats of Hollywood’s golden era and rivalled the crossover success of Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley The face of Doris Day, eerily beautiful in all its buttery-blond wholesomeness, beamed over Hollywood in the 50s and early 60s like a gigantic roadside billboard advertising the American way. In that extraordinary period of white America’s postwar prosperity and patriotism, Doris Day was the biggest box office and recording star in the US: easily equalling the music-movie crossover success of alpha males such as Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley, although somehow without being...

""FAREWELL DORIS Doris Day dead at 97 – Legendary actress passes away after 80 YEAR career as a Hollywood icon"" The actress was renowned for her wholesome image and starred in several hit films